


Darkest Hour

by wonder_boy



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety Disorder, Blood and Injury, Dissociation, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug, Mental Health Issues, Night Terrors, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Self-Harm, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:34:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23151802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wonder_boy/pseuds/wonder_boy
Summary: Malcolm was tired. So very tired. Tired of burying the impulses that are clawing at his skin to force their way out, free from the anxiety and all the lies he can’t keep up with. He never asked for any of this – not the trauma, not the girl, not his father, not to be born. Even surrounded by his newfound family, on the floor, hallucinating like a bad trip, he’s still tired. Tired of feeling like a burden.-A bad mental health day almost turns deadly.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell, Malcolm Bright & JT Tarmel
Comments: 22
Kudos: 146





	Darkest Hour

**Author's Note:**

> My second post to the fandom and it's a long one! I honestly didn't plan on it being this long but once I kept going I looked up and it was 11k! This one was a little darker than I thought so I have plenty of tags attached to the fic but I'll reiterate it here: trigger warnings for stabbing, blood, and self-harm mentions. It's not explicitly graphic but it may be triggering to some. I hope you enjoy this fic that is a bad mental health day for Malcolm. Any feedback is welcome!

Gil was the first to notice.

Malcolm walked into the precinct that morning with the familiar manic in his step, unusually cheerful for homicide at eight in the morning. He was in one of his many suits that he wore like armor with pants, shoes, and a coat to match. This time around, he walked in carrying three large coffees, all personalized from what he remembers about how the team likes their coffee. He was giddy with excitement at what he brought; this was one of his many ways he tried to connect even though they’ve already spent the past seven months together churning out murders in their sleep.

Any other day the behavior would get shrugged off as typical, no questions asked, but Gil knew his boy long enough to spot the signs of an oncoming episode.

Though he was exuding a rather jovial demeanor, anyone who knows him can distinguish what was real from what was an act. Malcolm has a habit of overcompensating when he’s in a negative frame of mind, constantly insisting that he was “fine” despite the obvious tremors. He’s not as good as he thinks he is when it comes to masking the insurmountable pain that has built up in his mind over the past twenty years.  


Everyone could see right through him.

Knowing that fact made it harder for Malcolm to even think about opening up.

On this particular morning, Gil was in his office looking over some paperwork when he heard a knock on his door. “Yeah?”

It was Malcolm steadily carrying the coffees with the biggest grin on his face.

“Morning, Lieutenant. I was on my way over and decided to make a quick stop for coffee. Here,” he walks over to his desk and places the cup with “Gil” written on it on his desk, “black, no cream, two sugars. It shouldn’t be too hot.” 

“Thanks, kid. You didn’t have to.” Gil picks it up with a grateful smile and takes a sip, letting it wash over him for a moment. “Mm, that’s good.” His reaction pleases Malcolm like a kid who’s proud to show off good grades on their report card; his approval meant more than he would ever admit out loud.

He looks around the empty office. “Where’s Dani and JT? I have theirs and I don’t want it to get cold.” Gil’s finishing his sip as he sits up in his chair. “They should be around here somewhere. Check in one of the cubicles, we haven’t gotten a case big enough for a profiler just yet. Probably doing some case work.”

His over-intrusive mind processes his words as a jab. He immediately shrugs it off as being dramatic because logically he knows the comment was completely harmless. He hates the small voice in his head; it has so much power to blow even the smallest things out of proportion or take words out of context. Even after all the sessions and medication changes, he finds that this little voice is as stubborn as he was – you’d think he’d be used to it by now.

Malcolm perks up with a small smile and heads for the door. “Bright,” Gil calls from behind. He spins around on his heels to face him again, eyebrows arching up with a question. 

“How’d you sleep last night?” he asks with suspicion, sipping from his cup. Malcolm hesitates to come up with a deflecting answer like clockwork so when it takes him two seconds too long to respond, Gil hums in understanding. “Okay, to be fair I did manage to get a couple of naps in yesterday so I don’t think it’s such a bad thing. And I fell asleep yesterday so that’s like, what, three hours in total?”

Gil puts his cup down with a sigh. He understands why sleep is hard to come by for Malcolm but this has been the fifth day in a row he’s shown up to work running on fumes, each day more cheery than before. He knows he’s bound to crash at any given moment and frankly he’s tired of giving the same spiel.

The bags under his eyes sit heavy on his face. Dark circles are creeping up from exhaustion and his skin was pale beyond comparison, losing the vitality it had before he started working for the NYPD. What worried Gil the most was the haunting look on his face.

There was nothing behind the eyes.

Empty, removed, distracted from being present in the moment, his mind elsewhere. He’s put effort into his outfit today but his eyes (besides his slightly trembling hand) are a dead giveaway.

Right now he can tell he’s trying to look present during the conversation but Gil’s seen this before; it usually doesn’t end well. He knows when Malcolm is keeping something from him. He becomes easily distracted, fixating on the case as it’s something palpable enough to ground him. Malcolm’s only going to do what Malcolm wants to do so Gil knows that there are some things not worth getting so worked up over.

The kid was tired beyond his understanding and there was no remedy that could cure the life he was forced to live.

“Just take it easy today. It’s slower than usual so there might be a case coming in soon. For now, you can pick up a file and start working.” He nods at his assignment. 

“Yes sir.”

JT and Dani aren’t too hard to find. He can spot JT’s tall silhouette from across the precinct with his arms folded talking to another cop. In true Malcolm Bright fashion, he barges in on the conversation unwarranted.

“JT! Officer,” he nods to the other guy who seems a bit perturbed, “I brought you something.” “Morning to you, too, Bright.” JT mutters in mock annoyance. Malcolm hands him his cup of coffee, insistent that he takes it. “I found this amazing café on my way over here and I thought I’d bring you guys a little something. Have you seen Dani?” he asks all in one breath. “If I say yes will you go away?” Malcolm shakes his head like a child that it almost makes JT crack a smile. 

“Check the breakroom, she walked in there a few minutes ago.” When Malcolm walks away, JT watches him go as he sips on his coffee, amused by the simplicity in Bright.

On a mission to deliver his last coffee, Malcolm heads towards the breakroom where he finds Dani sitting at one of the tables on her phone with a water by her side. She’s occupied with her phone until Malcolm makes his presence known. “Find something interesting?” His voice startles her out of her daze and he instantly puts his free hand up in surrender. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

She puts her phone down with a shrug. “Its fine, I wasn’t really looking at anything.” Malcolm notes the white lie with a curt smile but doesn’t dwell on it. “Where’d that come from?” she asks pointing to the carrier in his hand. “Oh, it’s coffee. For you,” he hands her the cup with her name on it, genuinely happy when she takes it with a small smile. “How did you know that we’re out of coffee?”

“I didn’t, actually. I just thought I should do something nice for everybody. You know, since we’re a team and all.” She hums when she drinks, visibly surprised that he got her exact order. He could stand and stare at her enjoying the gift all morning but he remembers the assignment Gil gave him so he puts the idea to rest.

“Well, I’m glad you like it. But I have to go and get into some paperwork Gil wants me to do.” She puts her cup down with a nod. “Sure thing. I’ll see you around, then.”

He drops the carrier in the trash next to the door and waves as he leaves; Dani watches him practically skip out of the breakroom. There’s a box of files waiting for Malcolm on his desk so he gets comfy in his chair and gets to work.

He spends the rest of his morning hunched over sifting through case files drowning out the bustling of the precinct. He doesn’t think to eat or pause for a quick break – he’s looking for the outlier in a string of homicides so anything outside of that wasn’t exactly a priority. 

At some point, his mind begins to wander. There’s a shadow of someone in his peripheral but he ignores them like the others. He’s aware that his lack of sleep is draining whatever energy he has left, making it harder to concentrate on the case in front of him. He grimaced at the intrusion of nausea that was settling in the pit of his stomach alerting him that he needed to eat something soon.

He could step out for a minute to grab something from a local shop on the corner but he didn’t have the energy to get up. An exchange that wouldn’t take longer than maybe ten minutes felt like an impossible task today; he just couldn’t move.

He didn’t have the energy for much of anything nowadays.

Malcolm knows that it’s the fatigue that’s weighing him down – that, coupled with his inconsistent, unhealthy lifestyle choices. The bottom line is that he needed something on his stomach quick. Any other day, he would’ve taken something from the breakroom by now but there was a looming figure standing behind him that kept him tied to his chair.

Anxiety sneaks up on him and sits on his chest making it harder to breathe right because it dawns on him very quickly that he really can’t move. It wasn’t just the fatigue – this mass casting an intimidating shadow over him made his skin crawl and the hairs on his neck stand.

He doesn’t know who’s behind him or what they want.

This one was different from the others.

He finds himself paralyzed in fear.

Malcolm shuts his eyes and nervously counts to ten, something Gabrielle taught him when he was a little kid when the figures in the corner wouldn’t go away. He knows it won’t work now but he fights to convince his overactive mind that this person isn’t real.

A hand clasps him on his shoulder and he practically jumps out of his skin at the contact. To his relief, it’s Dani, who is now staring at him in confusion and concern.

“You good?” she asks for the millionth time. He’s trying to discreetly catch his breath so all he does is nod even though his tremor contradicts his answer. “So what’s with the shaky hand?” “Nothing,” he starts, regaining his posture, “it’s fine. I’m fine.”

She doesn’t buy it of course but she decides it's better to not to push it. “Well, I’m about to head out with JT for a bite. Want to come? The shop’s only a couple blocks from here.”

Though the offer is tempting, he doesn’t have the willpower to remove himself from his chair. He enjoys spending time with his team but right now, it felt like it was going to be too much work to even participate.  


“Sorry, but I think I’ll pass on this one. I haven’t been able to find a lead yet but I think I may be on to something. Rain check?” For a split second, Dani seems to be disappointed but she doesn’t show it and makes a suggestion instead. “It’s cool. We’ll bring you something.”

With that, she walks out of the precinct. The little voice in the back of his head is back, twisting her words to something more believable. She’s upset with him, he concludes.

He blew off another chance to connect with them and he blew it.

They probably don’t even consider themselves a team, anyways.

The coffee was a bad idea.

She probably only offered to bring him something back because she pitied him, he tells himself.

He spirals some more, only coming to when a loud crash from the hall snaps him out of it. He doesn’t realize that he’s been dissociating for the past twenty minutes.

Gil is the one to break him out of his haze when he notices that Malcolm hasn’t moved more than an inch since Dani had left. He’s got a look on his face that’s void of any color with a gaze unfocused but a mind at work. So it’s started, he quietly tells himself.

“How are we doing on the case so far?”

A familiar voice breaks through the static that leads him to Gil.

It takes Malcolm a second to gather his thoughts before he could rattle off what he knew about the victims. There’s a nagging sensation in his bones that makes him feel watched, exposed, so he tries his best not to bring any attention to it.

“Uh, they’re all vastly different from one another. For instance, this guy was stabbed twelve times in a park versus this woman who ingested a lethal amount of poison inside her home. The men suffer a more brutal and aggressive form of dying while the women’s cause of death aren’t as assertive and destructive. The profile suggests misogyny but that’s like half of New York.” Gil gives him a look for the comment but Malcolm laughs, eyes crinkling at his own terrible joke.

“Did you check occupations, bank records, anything that could possibly establish any kind of connection to the vics?” Malcolm sighs leaning back in his chair, frustration on the edge of his mind. “Not yet. The killer’s consistent, at least. The methods for the woman are staged like a suicide but the strangulation and rope burns suggest otherwise. All relatively young, impressionable maybe. I can’t really put my finger on it. I’ll keep looking into it.”

Just as he turns away in his chair, Gil rests his hand on his shoulder to keep him from moving. 

“Actually, why don’t you come into my office for a bit? The case I’m working on is at a dead end and I could use some company.” There’s a fondness to his words that has the same effect on Malcolm every time. There’s a calmness and sense of security to Gil that he gravitates to whenever days were harder to bear than others. On a day like today, Malcolm’s more than happy to spend time with Gil cracking cases, just like old times.

They get comfortable on the floor of his office. Reports are spread out in a certain fashion in attempt to find the missing link between them. At some point, Dani and JT came back to the office to drop the pair their lunch off. Malcolm was thankful that the food Dani brought was manageable even though he picked at it for a good portion of their afternoon.

Sundown was approaching and they were nowhere near finding a link in their victims. They tracked down a couple of leads but for the most part, they were dead ends. Malcolm was having a very hard time establishing a decent profile and Gil could tell he was just about ready to implode. Outside of the sparse details in the case itself, Malcolm was exhausted unlike anything he had experienced before.

Gil watched him nod off a couple of times before suggesting that he take a quick nap on his couch. He declined, of course, but not getting adequate sleep was starting to blur his vision a little bit. When he’s unfocused like this, the images in his head become visceral and very real. His brain confuses the two realities and Malcolm gets stuck as if he were in a maze in his own psyche with no way out.

This time, a murky silhouette of a girl graces the shadows of his vision. She’s standing in the corner behind Gil’s desk with her dark hair covering her face. Patches of her skin rotting away like scales on her arms and the torn sheet covering her body hides the rest of her discolored scars. He’s seen her before. The night Eve slept over. The girl he never found.

She’s an active hallucination, way more aggressive than the others and it terrifies Malcolm knowing that she’s in the room with him. She doesn’t move from her spot but he can’t help but panic at the sense of danger she emanates. His breaths are shallow now, the tightening in his chest making it harder to breathe.

Gil knows something’s wrong when he looks up at a fearful Bright whose eyes were concentrated on something past his head. “Bright? You okay?” He waves his hand in front of his face but he’s too focused on the girl Gil doesn’t see. He looked like a deer caught in the headlights, eyes fixed on the very thing that could kill him.

In a breathless, fearful tone, Malcolm quietly chokes out, “She’s here.”

It takes a moment for the words to register in Gil but when they do, he gets closer to Malcolm to force his attention onto him. “Hey, look at me.” A small shake of the head. “Bright, look at me.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?” There’s a brief pause.

“Because she’s going to kill me.”

Warning bells sound off in Gil’s head. It’s clear to him that Malcolm feels like he’s in real danger with whoever he’s seeing so he needs to find a way to shift his focus. He gets up to make a call but Malcolm can’t hear anything.

They’re no longer in the precinct.

He’s in the loft, locked in his restraints like last time with no way of escaping.

He’s watching her move ever so slightly and when she starts walking towards him, he instinctively jerks back to try and get away. Dread consumes his psyche at the thought of this being how it all ends – a hallucination strong enough to stop his heart. 

Now he’s hyperventilating, his heart is caught in his throat, sweat on his brow but nowhere to run. There’s a pounding in his chest loud enough to hear but he can’t move and she’s getting closer and closer. She has a knack for weapons; the knife in her hand points at Malcolm as a threat he can’t escape.

“Why can’t you find me?”

He’s paralyzed. Something inside that was bigger than him kept him there locked onto her – guilt. The guilt of not knowing who she was and why he couldn’t save her when he had the chance. She was vengeful, a physical embodiment of his pain – fear, anger, frustration all wrapped up in a girl who was trying to hurt him.

She’s on his bed, straddling him with the knife raised above her head aimed at his chest and Malcolm’s in a full blown panic attack. He can’t seem to catch his breath and he was lashing out in his bands desperately trying to escape because he refused to accept the thought of dying here. He didn’t want to die like this, he couldn’t. 

How long would it take for someone to find him? Who would find him? He would be leaving his mother, Ainsley, JT, Dani, and Gil – 

“Please, please don’t do this –”

The lump in his throat coupled with fleeting tears did not grant any mercy from her; the knife rests on his shirt on top of the scar left by Watkins. They lock eyes – his wide with fear and hers low with resolve – and he shakes watching the gears turn in her head.

Her grip tightens. She raises the blade once more.

“No. No no no please –!”

“Bright!”

He was drowning. Drowning under the weight of his own fear, gasping for air, clarity, anything that could save him from the terror of his own demise. Pressure sagged on top of his shoulders, grabbing his arms, and held him there, forcing him to stay below the surface and endure the never-ending nightmare.

Malcolm violently thrashed in their arms to dodge what was coming but this weight was so heavy it constricted his breathing and he felt light-headed and dizzy with exhaustion. His breath was ragged, vision blurry and unfocused, desperately searching for the girl.

Where was she?

“Breathe, breathe. Just let it out...”

His vision was spotty and he coughed harshly to the side and choked on his spit in the process of trying to properly breathe again. When he started to come to, he was distraught, caught in a blur between what was real and what was imagined; he was too far gone to realize that JT was holding him down, Dani grabbing his legs, and Gil was at his side looking for an opening.

A strong wave of nausea stiffened his movements making him pause to concentrate and let the feeling pass. The panic hadn’t subsided yet and he was still shaking as if he were caught in the cold. Fear started to dissolve when he vaguely recognized the desk in his fog which meant he wasn’t in his loft anymore – he was back at the precinct.

“What is this?” he asked in his hazy confusion. “Where is she?”

“No one’s here, Bright. It’s just us.”

He tries to gather his thoughts the best he could so he could focus on the soft, reassuring voice – something he believes to be tangible and real. Finally, his eyes slowly settled on Dani who was watching him intensely, waiting for a sign that he was fully conscious. “You good now?”

Instantly, reality had caught up to him like a wave crashing onto the shore. He felt the pressure above him and sunk into it, the warmth of their body weighing him down unlike the cold, damp hands gripping his throat. JT didn’t seem to mind the change.

Malcolm was tired. So very tired. Tired of having to fight for his sanity every day running from the monsters eating away at this illusion of a life he’s created. Tired of burying the impulses that are clawing at his skin to force their way out, free from the anxiety and all the lies he can’t keep up with. He never asked for any of this – not the trauma, not the girl, not his father, not to be born. Even surrounded by his newfound family, on the floor, hallucinating like a bad trip, he’s still tired. Tired of feeling like a burden.

Gil gently rests his hand on his leg to get his attention. “Malcolm?” He groaned in response, mainly at the throbbing impeding his head. “Hey,” JT calls, slightly shaking the lax figure in his arms. “Don’t even think about falling asleep on me, Bright.” Dani snickered as she let go of his legs and sat on her knees at his feet. He grudgingly removed himself from the warmth to sit up but kept his eyes trained on the floor, feeling pangs of embarrassment weigh him down instead.

“I’m fine.”

“You haven’t slept for five days and you just hallucinated someone trying to kill you. That doesn’t exactly scream “fine” to me.” Malcolm knows its useless trying to lie to Gil, the only person outside of his father who knew him like the back of his hand. He accepts defeat this time, no energy left to argue with him. “Take the rest of the night off. Tomorrow, too.”

That earned him an exasperated sigh but Gil wasn’t taking no for an answer. “You need to rest, Bright. If you’re going to continue to work here, I need fresh eyes working my cases.” Gil moves to sit next to him, trying to find those dull eyes he’s been staring at all day. “I know it’s not easy having to go through this every single day. Just promise me you’ll take better care of yourself from now on.”

Malcolm tensed at the hurt in Gil’s voice.

Great, another person he’s upset today.

Hurting Gil was a different kind of pain, like a wound that never heals. He know Gil means well but he can’t erase the fact that he’s screwed up yet again, disappointing the one person who means the world to him.  


Exhaustion is starting to wear him down so he just silently nods, suddenly craving the snug sheets on his bed. “I’ll have Dani take you home. Rest up, come back when you’re feeling better. I’ll check on you in the morning.”

Just like that, it was decided. Once he could muster the strength to pull his aching limbs off the floor, it was only a short walk to the car. They sat in silence the entire ride. Dani knew Malcolm long enough to know that she shouldn’t push it, that he needed his time to clear his head to avoid getting overwhelmed again. He wasn’t some delicate flower that needed saving but he’s been through so much in his life that just a little patience and understanding can go a long way.

He doses in and out for the most part. He rests his head on the freezing window with his eyes closed, sleep trying to take over but he’s stubborn enough to keep fighting it. It’s raining when they get to his loft. He lays his eyes on his bed and he’s never felt more drained, weaker than how he was feeling in that moment. The rain soaked his clothes sending chills down his spine when his skin hits the brisk air of the room.

“Go change out of your clothes. Maybe take a hot shower?” He mutely nods at the suggestion and heads for his bathroom. He does in fact take a hot shower; it takes him a second to undress because he’s unsteady on his feet. Malcolm turns the knob all the way until the water is scalding hot and steps in, too lethargic, too detached to feel the pins and needles prickling at his skin. There’s a numbness in his bones that guide him to the floor of his shower with his knees up to his chest and his arms resting on top.

For a while, time ceases to exist. Nothing seemed real at this point. The steady drum of the water was an afterthought as the noise from the shower faded out into a faint ringing in the back of his head. He could feel himself detach from his body, his mind somewhere in the distance watching everything from behind a glass window.

Malcolm couldn’t explain it, but there was this gut feeling that something was wrong. He couldn’t exactly piece it together in his haze but there was overwhelming discomfort in his chest, the only thing he could grab onto in this state.

He felt so foreign in his skin, not aware of what triggered his mind to stray from the here and now. Gradually, he pulls himself back to reality by leaning into the flow of the water, tracing the paths it takes on his body. He can feel the temperature of the water now, suddenly icy cold and he takes that as his cue to get out and dry off.

Dani turns from the boiling kettle and catches Malcolm rounding the corner in a fresh pair of sweats and a t-shirt with his hair still damp. He sits on one of the barstools at the island with his hands in his lap, making an effort to be present with her.

“You were in there for a minute, I started to get worried,” she starts, grabbing a cup from the cabinet. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I made you some tea while you were gone. Here,” She pours the tea from the kettle into the cup and sets it down in front of him. “This should help.”

“Thank you.”

It’s still hot and he’s thankful for the heat spreading in his palms. His hands rest on the marble with the cup but he’s still a little out of it so Dani offers a distraction.

“I bought a record player for my apartment the other day. Got it at one of those vintage antique shops, not the refurbished ones you can buy online. It’s got a couple of scratches on the side but I think that’s what makes it unique – a real testament to its history.” Malcolm knows this trick but he plays along anyway. “What kind of music do you play on it?”

Dani pulls one of the barstools to have a seat. “Depends on my mood. Mostly the Beatles or Simply Red, Sade, maybe a little Stevie Wonder if I find myself thinking about my dad.” She ducks her head with a smile, reminiscing on a memory. Malcolm notes the change in her demeanor and wants to follow it but he falters, uncertain if it was appropriate.

“What was he like?” he asks in the quiet of the room. She senses his hesitation in the question and starts slow, letting him know it was okay to ask.

“He was my whole life. Soul music was his everything and there was never a moment when he wasn’t playing it. I remember he used to blast the stereo with the windows down whenever we were playing in the front yard. He had a song for everything, too; cleaning, laundry, working – he was into just about every artist you could think of.” 

Her smile slowly starts to fade and Malcolm watches with worry knowing that her mind was drifting off into grief. Still, she continues, trying to remain strong for Bright on his worst days.

“When we were looking through some of his things after he passed, I took some of his vinyl’s with me. A couple of his little knickknacks, too. I’ve kept them for years with nowhere to put them until I got my own place. Now, they sit in the corner of the front room next to an old photo of us playing outside together. His memory lives through me.”

She lets the negative pang in her stomach pass and faces Malcolm with a soft smile. “You should come see his collection sometime. You know, maybe add some flavor to your library.” They both chuckle at the joke, lighthearted with no real bite to it. For a second, Dani could see that genuine smile of his, even if it’s only for a moment, she knows it’s there. It quiets the fear in her of leaving him alone tonight knowing that sleep hasn’t come easy. He’ll be just fine, she reasons, watching every crease in his face fold in laughter.

He’ll be just fine.

They talk some more, enjoying each other’s company until night falls and Malcolm’s finished his tea. Dani sends a text to Gil letting him know he’s feeling a bit better and that she’s headed back to the precinct. 

Malcolm knows she can’t stay all night to help him sleep but he wouldn’t admit that her leaving feels like a loss to him, even if it was just for a day. He’s bone-tired with a headache pounding against his temples that’s starting to make him feel dizzy again. His bed is calling his name right about now so he’s not too broken up on the fact that she can’t stay a little longer.

“Gil wants me back at the office.” While she starts to put her coat on, she looks out the window to see that it’s still pouring outside. “Traffic is going to suck, I can already tell.” She grabs her keys and phone and walks over to Malcolm who’s still at the barstool. “Are you going to be okay? Do I have to install cameras so Gil can watch you sleep?”

He hums at the thought. “I’m sure he would lose his mind.” He walks with her to the door so she could finally leave. “Call me if you need anything. Or Gil, maybe even JT. Just call us. I’m sure one of us will pick up.” He nods firmly, “I will.” For a second, she doesn’t buy it so she pushes. “Promise me, Bright. If you’re not okay you need to tell someone.”

He looks at her straight in the eyes to make sure she knew he understood. “I promise.”

They looked through each other for a moment before backing down. Dani got what she needed to hear and Malcolm was reassured that there were people looking out for him. “Goodnight, Bright. Get some sleep.” He opens his door to let her out. “I’ll try.” He sends her off with a faint smile into the night and shuts his door behind him.

His loft was empty now. Quiet, dark, unprotected, leaving him vulnerable to what was inevitably coming. Malcolm pushed the thought to the side so he could just focus on falling asleep before the night terrors ruin his chances. He climbs into the soft sheets, pops in his mouth guard and straps himself in for the night, silently hoping that his exhaustion will force a slumber long enough that’ll last till morning. He closes his eyes and lets the tiredness wash over him, pulling him into a deep sleep cycle.

All of his anxieties disappear with him.

It’s around two in the morning when Malcolm starts to stir in his restraints.

He tosses and turns in anguish, tugging on his leather chains in attempt to run from something he can’t hide from. It reaches a crescendo when he sits up in his bed with a cry, sweat on his brow and disheveled hair. His heart pounds against his ribs mimicking his erratic breathing which makes his lungs seize in effort to keep up. Malcolm spits out the mouth piece and yanks at his restraints, frustrated that he couldn’t remain sleeping like he had hoped.

He pulls a shaky breath unclipping himself from the cuffs and moves to sit on the edge with his head in his hands. The night terrors tend to leave him disoriented which takes a minute to readjust his memory. For a moment, the dark walls in his loft started to sway and the lights left a long trail in his eyes. He felt like he was sinking into the sunken sheets again with his arms feeling like lead at his sides. Even though he had been sitting up, a weight sat on his chest making it hard to move or breathe.

He knew what this was.

With agonizing dread he slowly turns his head to face the figure watching him from across the room: himself.

It was Malcolm, aged ten, wearing a hooded coat and dark pants with his boots, just like he had worn on the camping trip. It’s hard to make out his expression when he stands in the shadows but the bloodied switchblade in his hand is unmistakable. There’s a trace of blood on his tiny hands that’s grabbing the handle and a few streaks on his pants to match. The sight of his younger self covered in someone else’s blood not only terrifies him, but it makes his heart ache in remorse.

He debates whether or not if he should confront him directly but that decision is made for him when young Malcolm steps forward into the light coming from the window with unshed tears in his eyes. He’s broken up about something and he doesn’t say a word – he just stands, horror on his face with tear-stained cheeks. Judging by the dirt residue on his clothes, the blood on his pants and blade, Malcolm has an aching suspicion about what had taken place.

He doesn’t want to believe it.

But this was the only clue he’s gotten in a long time explaining what could’ve happened on that camping trip. Still, he didn’t want to believe it.

He looks back at his younger self whose head was now resting on his chest, quietly crying to himself. Malcolm couldn’t stand the sight of a child in pain, let alone himself. No child should ever have to deal with that kind of reality at such a young age and he wishes he could take all that hurt away. But here he is, twenty years later, watching a moment in time unfold in front of his very eyes.

“Hey,” he calls to him softly, “what’s the matter? Did something happen?” He only cries harder into his hands, unconsciously smearing some of the blood on his face. The reaction moves something in Malcolm to get up to comfort him but a part of him is still uneasy at his sudden appearance. Wiping away his tears was pointless when they kept falling but he was here for a reason; he needed to tell him something, to warn him for what was coming.

“I didn’t mean to hurt her.” He croaks out pitifully. Between the sniffles, his voice is laced with overwhelming despair and his stomach twisted in bouts of nausea in the aftermath. “I didn’t mean to...” He trails off into another crying fit that instinctively triggers Malcolm to protect him by removing himself from his bed and crouching down at his feet, searching for the reveal.

“What did you do?”

His cries die down but he won’t face the man staring back at him. “Please, I need to know what happened to her – you’re my only hope to figuring out what happened to the girl in the box. Tell me,” he nervously clings to his younger self pleading, “what did you do?” No answer came, only more tears. He started to panic at the thought of assuming the worst because what he feared deep down inside felt more and more realistic every passing second.

“What did you do?” he cried out.

“I think we both know what happened on that camping trip, Malcolm.”

Everything stopped. The words get caught in his throat, his heartbeat picks up, and his lungs freeze up as if a brutal chill just blew through the entire room cancelling all the noise in the loft. Malcolm’s breathing is shallow from the dread in his gut as he shares a worried look with his younger self, who’s staring at the figure behind him, eyes wide as if he was caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to do.

The edges of reality were thinning by the minute and the arrival of his father only sped things along. Young Malcolm realizes he’s a little too late to warn him of his father and he slowly starts stepping back into the shadows, anticipating whatever he had planned.

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. The truth takes time, Malcolm. I just wasn’t sure if you were ready to hear it.” It was a laughter that unnerved him, a cruel joke reminding him that he doesn’t know who he is and his beast of a father carefully hid the answers just to watch him squirm. He had no choice but to finally face the illusion of his father, a part of his subconscious that wants to tell him something, a string of memories he wasn’t prepared to understand.

“What do you want?” Malcolm grits out between his teeth. Martin smiles at that and takes a seat on his bed, admiring the space. “You have a lovely little spot here. Any chance I could get a house tour?” He looks to Malcolm for an answer but his son isn’t budging so he keeps talking. “Really, it’s a gorgeous place, Malcolm. Oh, and the restraints are a nice touch. Tell me, how bad are they?”

Malcolm’s deeply uncomfortable at his father’s intrusion in his loft. It makes him shift his feet and fold his arms to keep from fidgeting. He huffs out a sigh through his nose, “You’re here now, aren’t you? That should be a pretty good indicator of where my head is at right now.”

The look on Martin’s face doesn’t waver. “You know why I’m here, Malcolm. You saw something and now your subconscious wants to give you answers about our little camping trip. So, the answers come in the form of your most vigilant father.” He trails off as if he wants to say something else but he stands up from the bed and slowly starts to approach Malcolm making him step back at his advances.

He effectively corners Malcolm at the edge of his bed by the window, his eyes boring into his soul, picking him apart from the inside out. Martin wasn’t the one for straight answers – everything was a game to him, a trick Malcolm always fell for when he needed him the most. A part of his mind is screaming danger at the body looming over him but he’s lost the feeling in his legs, his nerve, and the ability to think rationally.

The threat was present. After observing the minuscule movements in his son, Martin knows that he has his full attention; Malcolm was helpless, confined to his will and hanging on every word coming out of his mouth.

“Which answer do you want to hear?” he starts, tension leaving his body as he relaxes. “No matter what I say, nothing will change what you did to her and you know it.” Malcolm bows his head in shame because he knows it’s the truth. Even so, he still believes that he wasn’t a killer, that what he did to her was prompted by his serial killer father and not by his own actions. 

“She’s dead because of you, Malcolm. Your mind has repressed this memory so you could be free to live out this fantasy of being a profiler and catching serial killers. You’ve lived a lie for twenty years, my boy. When are you going to realize that this,” he jesters to the entirety of the loft, “is not who you really are?”

Anger surged through him, breaking him out of his stupor and on the defensive as he turned on his father. He balled up his fists to stop the shaking so he could face him with unwavering vigor to prove his point. “My life was better without you in it. I excelled in my school work and exceeded expectations so I could secure the career I wanted at the most reputable criminal agencies in the entire country. I got to where I am without your help and I won’t let you undermine the risks it took to get here.”

He was seething at Martin. His chest heaved with exertion as he stared him down, challenging him to comment on the life he’s built for himself in spite of his actions. Though this was supposed to be intimidating, Martin was having a field day watching his son unravel as he struck a nerve, something that hit close to home. Martin keeps his expression neutral and pushes forward with a heavy sigh.

“Of course, my boy, I’m not denying your intellectual capabilities. But let’s face it, Malcolm: the only reason why you’re in this field is because of me.” “Sure. I hunt down people like you because I want to stop this cycle from ever happening again. You know this.”

“So, what is all of this? Do you think this life you live is some sort of atonement for not stopping me sooner?”

Martin knows he’s hit the nail on the head when Malcolm visibly falters, frantically searching for a response to counter his father. They stare in silence when he can’t come up with one and Martin could feel the power draining from his son. “You’re wasting your time, Malcolm. Hell, you’ve already wasted twenty years. You’ve denied me for so long only for it to lead you right here...” Martin steps closer, now towering over Malcolm’s small frame, “back to me.”

Panic starts to slowly set in the pit of his stomach. He’s way too close and it makes his lungs constrict as if the walls were caving in, trapping him under the rubble and debris of his father, buried in the lurking thoughts that keep him up at night. He can’t breathe. “Leave me alone.” he says through the pants, adrenaline allowing him to move past his father towards the kitchen.

“You can’t run from me, Malcolm. I’m already in your head. And besides,” Martin follows him into the kitchen right on his heels, “it’s not like this is new information. You killed that girl, stabbed John and to achieve your personal best, you went and stabbed me right in the heart. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty impressed, if I do say so myself.” he chuckles as Malcolm stops dead in his tracks, flashes of the night at Claremont flooding his psyche.

He needs this to stop. For a moment Malcolm is frozen, stuck in a wave of memories old and new, fragments he’s already analyzed among fresh ones he’s never seen before. Martin’s holding onto his son, hovering as he guides the switchblade in his tiny hands towards the abdomen of a woman his father had taken. Her jacket seemed too bulky to cut through but his father was insistent that it wasn’t a big deal if he pushed hard enough.

The new memory isn’t complete in the slightest; there’s pieces of his father’s uncanny smile, a trail of blood on the forest floor, and red coating his small fingers, unsure of how it got there. It flickers from the blade against the jacket to the vivid plunging of the knife into her skin, blood profusely pouring out of the deep incision. Then he’s stabbing John out of fear and leaving him for dead because he was scared that he would chase him with his own bigger, sharper knife. An echo of his father’s scream cascades over the memories and he’s back at Claremont, watching his father fall onto the floor in pure agony with a stake in his chest, Malcolm looking on, distant, as if his actions weren’t his own.

Reality catches up to him and he’s in a full panic attack, hyperventilating through the assault of horrific images clouding his headspace. He stumbles to the island to lean on it for support but when he catches his father walking towards him, he instinctively pulls a knife from the block and haphazardly waves it in his direction. “Get back.” he warns between breaths, trying to remain as calm as he could. Martin is quiet as he tracks him, his presence getting bigger the closer he is to his son. Malcolm moves to walk backwards towards his bed so he could get to his phone but it just seems so far away and out of reach.

His breathing was fast and shallow, chest tight under the weight of his father, and his legs started to give out under him as Martin closed the distance between them. Like a predator stalking his prey, Malcolm knew he needed to break away or else he would get caught in a trap that’s hard to get out of. He remembered what Dani said earlier – he needed to get to his phone and call someone. His body moved in flight mode, Malcolm desperately waving the knife around in a panic to fend off his father as he pressed on, not budging at his futile attempts.

“Get back!”

He was too focused on what was in front of him that he tripped and fell back onto the stairs, knife still in hand but the fight knocked out of him. His lower back collided with the top step and he let out a small cry, his face twisted in pain as his muscles throbbed at the intrusion. This only excited Martin, watching his son writhe on the floor like a child, pushing his limits to see how much he could take before he cracked under pressure. From the looks of it, Malcolm was teetering on the edge.

His eyes burned with tears – he was scared, afraid. Afraid of the monster leaning down in his face, hollowing him out with just one look, reaching for something buried so deep within himself that he thought never existed. His lip quivered as tears began to fall, fear taking over his body, leaving him on the floor in shattered, broken pieces. Malcolm groaned as his father stood over him, his invasive gaze exposing him unlike anybody else.

He was trapped.

“It’s no use, Malcolm.” Martin crouched down in front of his son with a pitiful look on his face, trying on the mask of mock sympathy. He spoke in the sweetest voice possible, one that made Malcolm’s skin crawl and his stomach churn. 

“You have to let me in, my boy. Think about it: you can be absolved of all of this – the night terrors, the hand tremors, the anxiety, and depression – if you would just stopping running, stop suppressing who you truly are. Of course, if you continue to betray me,” Martin sighs and stands up from his position and Malcolm could sense the threat growing, surging his fear and kicking his adrenaline into overdrive, “then you leave me with no choice. I will force my way in.”

All of the color drained from his face when he saw that his father wasn’t joking. He was no longer smiling but instead his face was absent of emotion, empty, staring down at Malcolm with promise, blank and unable to read. He’s seen that look once before and the end result wasn’t pretty in the slightest; Malcolm refused to be on the receiving end. His throat seized up, his breaths coming out in gasps and fresh tears welled in his eyes as he scrambled to reach his phone again, petrified at what was coming.

He abandoned the knife as he reached his nightstand to pull his phone from its charger and anxiously tried to unlock it but he was shaking so much that he couldn’t get it right. A couple of failed attempts later, he opened his contacts and presses a name, relieved that he was getting help but absolutely terrified at the menacing pair of eyes boring holes in his chest. 

“Put the phone down, Malcolm.” he warned.

His eyes were squeezed shut as each ring felt like an eternity, hoping he would get an answer before it was too late. “I said,” Martin marches toward the figure curled in on himself by the nightstand, “put the phone down.” Just as he’s about to grab him, the other line picks up, and Malcolm’s never been more relieved in his life until now.  


“Malcolm?” comes a gruff voice on the other end.

He cries harder when he gets an answer and for a brief moment, Malcolm feels like he’s been saved. His responses come in quick, pained breaths, still too panicked to formulate sentences but he hurriedly tries to get the message across.

“Gil! Please, I need you. He’s...” when he looks back, his father has disappeared along with the knife, terror surging throughout his body unsure of where he lurked. 

“What? What’s going on, Bright?”

He breaks out into a sob, overwhelmed with the fear of dying but too numb, too scared to fight back. This stirs something deep and primal in Gil, the urge to protect his son guiding him to throw on whatever he had worn the night before, grab his keys, wallet, and gun all while trying to pry answers out of Malcolm.

“Kid, answer me. Where are you? I’m coming to you.”

The line goes quiet for a minute, and Gil is aching with anticipation as he waits for Malcolm to speak, listening to his labored breathing through the phone.

“He’s here,” he strains out in a whisper, “in the loft. He’s going to kill me.”

The line goes dead before Gil could get a chance to respond. In seconds, he’s out of his house and into his car, speeding down Manhattan without trying to break the speed limits. Those last words haunted him the entire car ride, echoing Malcolm’s broken pleas for help at two in the morning on loop. He couldn’t shake the paranoia. Rarely did Malcolm ever call him in a time of crisis but this was a new low for him, crying in distress that someone had it out for him and Gil couldn’t figure out who.

All he knew was that Malcolm needed him and that was enough to stop the questions and focus on the road ahead of him.

It was approaching three by the time he pulled up to the loft and he wasted no time hoping out of his car and sprinting up the stairs to his door. He pulled the spare key Malcolm gave him from his pocket but Gil immediately jerked back when he heard a piercing scream on the other side of the door. He makes quick work of the lock and burst through the door with his gun drawn, eyes focused, anxiously searching for his son.

It was loud – the noises coming from Malcolm were a mixture of shrieks and gut-wrenching sobs that filled every corner of the room, a string of no’s behind every wail. Through the darkness of the loft Gil can spot Malcolm on the floor near the bed, his legs tucked under his thighs, his head in his hands, and a dirty knife on the floor next to him.

“Malcolm –!”

Gil rushes through the kitchen over to his side, frantically looking him over for any injuries as he kneels down in front of him, creating enough distance so he doesn’t spook him. He notices a steady stream of blood sliding down his arms and soaking through his pants mixed in with the tears falling from his face. His hair was disheveled and his night wear crinkled through the creases.

He was inconsolable. His voice was raw from screaming through his father’s provocations, aggressively vexing him to submit to the dark corners of his mind and embrace his eager impulses. Martin kept at it for what felt like forever, pushing Malcolm to his limits, destroying the loose fabric of what was left of his psyche. He was relentless. It was like watching some sick mental torture.

Eventually, he would succumb to his father’s wishes, giving anything for him to stop tearing him apart from the inside out. Unfortunately, it was a minute too late for Gil, and Martin reveled in his impeccable timing.

“Kid, what the hell happened? Did someone hurt you?” Gil looks at the trembling body in front of him in disbelief, trying to piece the scene together. His cries are reduced to sniffles and stray tears when he hears a familiar voice pull him out of his hysteria. A lot had happened in the twenty minutes it took for Gil to get to his place. He wasn’t anticipating the sudden silence.

“Bright. Is there anyone –”

“He was right.” he chokes out weakly.

Gil stares at him, trying to read his movements. “Who, Bright?”

Martin towers over Malcolm with a smile, disgusted by Gil’s presence but he doesn’t let it bother him – he has him now, right where he wants him.

“He was right,” he moans in defeat, his body slacking to the side, “I am a monster.”

It slowly starts to click for Gil that no one else is in the loft except them. That the ghost of Martin Whitly has been terrorizing him all night which prompted the phone call and Malcolm was desperate to make the voices stop. Tension leaves his body as he concludes there was no intruder but there’s a sharp pain in his heart as he watches him break down in quiet sobs.

He was visibly exhausted down to the bone. Outside of the tears and blood on his arms, there was no life in Malcolm left for him to give. He was tired of fighting – for twenty years he’s been trying to outrun his past only for it to catch up with him and swallow him whole. His father was right.

“I’m glad to hear that Malcolm. Now,” Martin starts to rub his shoulders with heavy hands and a playful look on his face that Malcolm doesn’t have to look up to see it, “let’s get started, shall we?”

He flinches like a chill went down his spine and turns to Gil, eyes wide with horror as his face fell, his breathing picking up again. For a moment, the tears stop. His eyes are glossy but Gil knows something just happened – a switch was pulled because Malcolm shifted and made a hasty effort to move away from him. It was that same haunting look from this morning: empty, nothing behind the eyes except pure devastation and anguish. “Uh uh, not so fast, my boy.” Martin chimes as he keeps him steady. “We have work to do.”

“Bright, what’s going on?”

Malcolm shook his head as realization dawned on him.

“No. No no no I won’t do it, I won’t –” tears prickled at the corners of his eyes again, “I won’t do it.”

Gil’s nervous now as he creeps closer to him, reaching out to stifle whatever this is. “Do what, Bright? What is he telling you to do?” Malcolm breaks into another sob, sounding more mangled and broken than before. He’s sick to his stomach at the horrid thought of what his father was implying and it makes him dangerously ill. Martin briefly eyes the knife laying by Malcolm as he continues to swell with panic. Everything goes black for a split second, and when Malcolm adjusts to the abrupt change, he’s not sure if he’s in control of his body anymore.

“You need to go.” he mumbles, not loud enough to be heard.

“What?”

“Get out of here, just go!” Gil is in his face now trying to make sense of the chaos in his head because he doesn’t want to leave him again to fight another war within himself. He cups Malcolm’s face gingerly, trying to keep him steady and present. 

“I’m not leaving you, Bright,” Gil’s voice low and calming, “You’re in pain. I can’t just walk out of here knowing that you’re a danger to yourself – you know that.”

Malcolm’s not hearing it, too focused on diverting him from his father’s growing displeasure. “Please just go...” he begs, misery sewn in his features. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Gil pauses.

Reassess.

Slowly starts to pull away.

What did he just say?

Martin’s giddy with anticipation barely containing his excitement above Malcolm who’s gone eerily quiet.

“Bright, I don’t – you would never hurt me, right?”

No response. He just focuses on the ground.

“Okay, this is getting a little dramatic, even for me. Let’s speed things up a bit.” Gil’s on high alert when Malcolm reaches for the knife on the floor. His heart sinks as he doubts himself – Malcolm wasn’t capable of this, he wasn’t capable of hurting another person let alone family. Gil was running out of options because he had no way of safely bringing him back. He needed to deescalate the situation.

But it’s hard when your son is the one holding the knife.

“Come on, Malcolm,” His father reaches down and guides the knife in his hand like he did on the camping trip and Martin had to make sure his son’s resolve was strong enough to go through with it. “Just like I taught you.” He makes an unexpected lunge towards Gil but it’s quickly deflected and Gil is forced to go on the defensive. Gil knows he has the upper hand on Malcolm without a shadow of a doubt but the profiler is quick and unpredictable and he doesn’t want to cause him any serious injuries taking him down. 

“Bright, stop. This isn’t you.”

“Oh, on the contrary, detective,” Martin’s talking as if Gil could hear Malcolm’s thoughts, “there are so many things you don’t know about my boy. Trying to replace me was a grave mistake.”

They’re at the top of the stairs by his bed when he lunges at him again and Gil quickly grabs hold of his right arm, making Malcolm cry out in pain as his nails dig into the fresh gashes on his arms. It’s a foul move but Gil isn’t trying to cut his chances for a swift submission. He pulls Malcolm onto the bed wrestling him for this knife, keeping it in his line of sight while trying to put all of his weight forward to keep Malcolm from moving.

He struggles under Gil, kicking his legs and twisting his body every which way to leverage an escape until he finds a weak spot. He manages to get his free arm out and balls his fist to strike Gil in his left eye, momentarily distracting him as he squirms his way free from the figure bowing in pain. He strikes Gil’s spine with his elbow and forces him on his back aiming to get the perfect angle for Martin. In seconds he’s on top of him with a grip on the knife that makes his knuckles go white, concentrated on the tip of the knife digging into the dip in his neck.

Gil knows he’s lost. One wrong move and Malcolm could end up in white scrubs for the rest of his life. He wasn’t going to let that happen. Even with a blade to his neck, Gil still reached out to him the only way he knew how.

“I know he’s in there Bright. He put you up to this, right?” Malcolm just grips harder without saying anything. Gil searches for an out but it’s tight and he doesn’t want to risk startling him. Instead, he cautiously lays one of his hands on top of Malcolm’s fist and tries to relax into a small smile. Now was not the time to fight with him; Malcolm wasn’t in his right frame of mind to begin with. He needed patience and understanding – someone to look him in the eyes and share his pain with him no matter how brutal and suffocating it could be. He needed to know that he wasn’t alone anymore.

“You are not a monster. You’re a survivor, kid. I wouldn’t even be here without you, remember?”

He swallows hard trying to keep steady but his own anxiety is getting the best of him. “You are nothing like your father. What he did was not your fault – you were just a kid. Giving into him will not bring those victims back and you need to stop punishing yourself for it. What makes you think he even cares about you?”

He hasn’t made a move yet so Gil takes it as a sign that he’s listening, not entirely gone as he thought. He sees a flash of an emotion that’s gone too quick for him to identify. His boy was still in there.

“If he truly loved you, Malcolm, you wouldn’t be risking your life to find the answer.”

Gil could feel the grip on the handle loosen ever so slightly and he watches his son come to the forefront in a daze with misty eyes. He blinks a couple of times to register what’s in front of him and when he does, the walls collapse in on themselves and the dam breaks.

Gil uses this opening to remove the knife from his hands and finally move from under him so he could steady himself to coax Malcolm. He crumbles as Gil holds onto him, his hand rubbing small circles on his back as he cries out everything left in his body. Malcolm has his head in the crook of Gil’s neck as Gil carefully holds him by his side letting him sob in agony. Everything that he’s bottled up until now – words left unsaid, guilt, infamy, and the intrusive voice in his head reminding him how much of a burden he was – left his body trembling with grief.

Things were different now. Gil was never going to look at him the same and Malcolm mourns the loss of what used to be. This was just damage control, he tells himself; he was no longer that scared little kid in the foyer watching his father being taken away. Instead, he was the man who put a knife to the throat of the only person who saw past the alias and accepted him for all of his imperfections in spite of his upbringing. Nobody cares for him like Gil does, and Malcolm lets a few tears slip at the thought of losing him.

They sit in the dark for what felt like hours. When Malcolm starts to stir, he leans on Gil’s shoulder and lazily wipes his face. Gil gives him time to readjust on the bed but neither of them spoke to each other. Gil started first.

“What happened to your arms?”

It took a minute for Malcolm to find his voice.

“I uh,” he starts, his voice hoarse and uneven, “sometimes when it gets really bad, my hallucinations become very realistic. The only way I get rid of them is using physical pain. Something that I know is real.” They aren’t looking at each other and Gil thinks maybe it’s for the best. 

The pain in his arms is a throbbing afterthought – he’s so emotionally exhausted that he barely notices it. Gil straightens up some and looks down at Malcolm, hoping that he would be honest with him.

“How long?”

“Ever since I started seeing him again, I guess.”

He doesn’t need details. It isn’t easy for him to open up like is he now but Malcolm eases up because he knows that he doesn’t have to lie to Gil. Even though Martin isn’t there anymore, he’s left in the rubble of his father’s torment and it leaves him feeling detached as his mind tries to process this new set of memories. “You know what this means, right?” Gil asks minutes later.

Malcolm slowly nods at what he was implying, an unspoken agreement to tell no one unless it was absolutely necessary. He doesn’t want to be put in a hole for twenty four hours. The closed walls always made him feel trapped physically and emotionally and the hard questions made his head spin in confusion. At this rate he was going to be kept there longer than the benchmark requirement and his stomach turned at the feeling of being held hostage.

Gil rises from the bed and Malcolm does his best to not fall over as the warm body leaves his side. “I’ll make your bag. Can you get changed by yourself?” He solemnly nods but he’s too tired to move from his spot. So, he watches Gil move around his room while he tries to put a bag together and answers any questions he has. He makes note of his prescriptions and sleeping patterns so the person at the front desk can try to make accommodations.

When Gil has his things ready to go, Malcolm is still sitting on the bed in the same stained clothes. He tries to give him a sympathetic look when he puts the bag down by the steps, knowing how much he hated hospitals. He sits with a heavy heart because he doesn’t want to face this, he just wants to bury it like he has all these years and forget it ever happened. Gil sat back down on the edge of the bed and holds Malcolm’s hand to let him know he wasn’t going through it alone.

“I can’t do this, Gil.”

He gently moves his hand to the back of his neck and held him there, doing his part to console his overactive mind. “I know, kid. But I also know that you can’t keep going like this. There are some things you should work through when you’re there, and I will come by whenever I get a chance to.” His heart breaks at the tears welling up in his eyes yet this time Malcolm wipes them away before they get a chance to fall.

In this moment he felt so small compared to the size of whatever he was feeling. He moved to put his back against the headboard with his hands in his lap as he stares at the mess he made on his skin.

“Can we,” he clears his throat to stop the tears from coming, “can we sit here? Just for a little while?” His pleading blue eyes made Gil’s heart ache and he couldn’t say no to that. Without a word, Gil sits right next to Malcolm and silently holds his hand when he was offered it.

Together they sat in the quiet of the loft.

The silence he shares with Gil erases his fear of being alone.

The grip on his hand tightens and Malcolm faintly grips his hand back.

He’ll be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> I have a tumblr! Leave a note @wonder-boy if you'd like. Thank you for reading!


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